Even though she was acknowledged as a great actress, singer and dancer by audiences in the U.S. and Europe, today she is mostly forgotten. Nina Mae McKinney, who made her screen début in King Vidor’s Hallelujah! But Robinson was not the first ballplayer in the long history of big league baseball known to be an African-American. Mary Ellen Pleasant, an early African-American businesswoman, circa 1860s. This historic performer's grandparents were slaves, her entire career nothing if not a statement of the possibilities for her race when allowed a status above that of enforced laborer. These remarkable black men and women never received obituaries in The New York Times — until now. “Well-Known Artist Alfred Hair Slain,” read the headline in The Fort Pierce News Tribune newspaper in Florida. She performed the role of Kate Monster/Lucy the Slut in Avenue Q, and performed in the musical Vanities, in which she played the character of Joanne. He caught 46 games, all barehanded and hit a .251 average. The career of Nina Mae McKinney and the appearance of Chick in Hallelujah mark the beginning of a significant rebellion against Hollywood's expectations for black actors and black characters in terms of agency and racial representation. She was the first to sign a deal with a major studio -- MGM. I have just modified one external link on Nina Mae McKinney. In 1901, an elderly Pleasant dictated her autobiography to the journalist Sam Davis. Her life inspired a Toni Morrison novel. McKinney played the leading role in that first all-black musical film. Nina Mae McKinney is known as the seductress "Chick" from Hallelujah (1929), the first all-black, all-sound musical. On March 5, in San Francisco, The Times is hosting an evening honoring the Overlooked series. There will be performances by the spoken-word poet FreeQuency, the singer Martha Redbone and the a cappella ensemble Vocal Rush, and a discussion with Amy Padnani, the editor of Overlooked, Veronica Chambers, an archival story editor and Lauretta Charlton, the editor of Race/Related. No one suspected that the note was written by a black woman named Mary Ellen Pleasant. Nina Mae McKinney is known as the seductress "Chick" from Hallelujah (1929), the first all-black, all-sound musical. Zelda Wynn Valdes was a designer to the stars who could fit a dress to a body of any size — even if she had to do so just by looking at the client. An inventor known as the ‘Black Edison.’ He found that recognition came at a hefty price. Visit timesevents.nytimes.com for more events about Black History Month and other NYT journalism. Read more and get tickets. By AMISHA PADNANI and VERONICA CHAMBERS JAN. 31, 2019. When the abolitionist John Brown was hanged on Dec. 2, 1859, for murder and treason, a note found in his pocket read, “The ax is laid at the foot of the tree. We started the series last year by focusing on women like Sylvia Plath, the postwar poet; Emma Gatewood, the hiking grandmother who captivated a nation; and Ana Mendieta, the Cuban artist whose work was bold, raw and sometimes violent. A gender-bending blues performer who became 1920s Harlem royalty. Looking for more? Nina Mae McKinney - Nina Mae McKinney is known as the seductress Chick from Hallelujah (1929), the first all-black, all-sound musical. Check out the full list of winners. So she carved a niche in Europe. This Lancaster, SC native made it big on broadway and went on to star in film and television. But all were pioneers, shaping our world and making paths for future generations. Showing search results for "Nina Mae Mckinney" sorted by relevance. As Lynn Hudson writes in the book “The Making of ‘Mammy Pleasant’: A Black Entrepreneur in Nineteenth-Century San Francisco,” Pleasant told Davis, “Before I pass away, I wish to clear the identity of the party who furnished John Brown with most of his money to start the fight at Harpers Ferry and who signed the letter found on him when he was arrested.” The sum she donated was $30,000 — almost $900,000 in today’s dollars. Her civil rights efforts predate those of Rosa Parks by a century, though the two are often compared. Nina Mae's last hurrah in films was in "Pinky" from 1949 where Nina Mae had a short but significant performance. They often attempted to break the same barriers again and again. We added to that collection each week. Alfred Hair in his high school yearbook photo. 21. Nina Mae McKinney. Charlotte Hawkins. Related Topics. (1929) – one of the first Hollywood films to feature an all-black cast – was hailed by MGM’s Irving Thalberg as ‘the greatest acting discovery of the age’. Dondi presenting his work from “Style Wars” courtesy of Public Art Films, Inc. He helped start the Highwaymen, a collective of Floridian artists, all African-American, who painted vibrant landscapes of their home state. Sadly, when she succumbed to a heart attack on May 3, 1967 at the age of 54, her death went unnoticed in the entertainment industry and by the media, except for a small notice in a local paper. Nina Mae McKinney is exactly why I love Black History Month — every year I learn about somebody or something new during this annual celebration of our oft-overlooked foundation-layers. I made the following changes: Many of them were a generation removed from slavery. ABOUT 20 MINUTES INTO “Hallelujah,” Hollywood’s first all-sound feature with an all-black cast, Nina Mae McKinney appeared on screen as Chick, a singer and dancer, in a sexy flapper dress. Actress Nina Mae McKinney plays Rozelia in the 1949 film Pinky. Scott Joplin circa 1904. Moses Fleetwood Walker, the first black man to play for a major league baseball team. The cyclist Major Taylor in 1898. More than a half century before a “curvy” model made the cover of the Sports Illustrated swimsuit issue, and before hashtags like #allbodiesaregoodbodies, there was a designer who knew that it was the job of clothes to fit the woman, not vice versa. The film is directed by Zoltan Korda. In the post-Civil War era, the cruel breath of slavery and the aborted plan of Reconstruction still hung over the American South. Nina Mae McKinney as Lilongo and Paul Robeson as Bosambo, both in the movie Sanders of the River. The Lancaster, South Carolina native was reared by her great-aunt, Carrie Sanders on the Estate of Colonel LeRoy Sanders, where her … Please upgrade your browser. See a detailed Nina Mae McKinney timeline, with an inside look at her movies, marriages & more through the years. Born Nannie Mayme McKinney in Lancaster, South Carolina, Nina got her start as a 16-year-old dancer in the chorus line on Broadway, in Lew Leslie ’s production Blackbirds of 1928; a performance that resulted in her snagging the part of ‘Chick’ in King Vidor’s first all-Black 1929 talking picture Hallelujah, as a last minute replacement for Ethel Waters or Honey Brown, who were both being considered for the role. He made you want to soak up the exuberance he clearly felt in delivering a whole new way of telling stories. Nina Mae McKinney. Read about the project’s first year, and use this form to nominate a candidate for future Overlooked obits. But in the Joplin home, banjo and fiddle music filled the family’s evenings, giving the children — Scott in particular — a sense of music’s power to move. 679 likes. She was the first African American actress to hold a principal role in a mainstream film. That distinction belongs to Moses Fleetwood Walker. See the fabulous presenters and gracious winners at this year's Oscars. (1929), the first all-black, all-sound musical, and became an international figure, little is known about her life. Nina Mae McKinney (June 13, 1913 – May 3, 1967) was an American actress. The same is true of the captivating Nina Mae McKinney, a forerunner of say Dorothy Dandridge or Halle Berry. “I only fit her once in 12 years,” Valdes told The New York Times in 1994 of her long-time client Ella Fitzgerald, “I had to do everything by imagination for her.” Valdes would simply look at Fitzgerald in the latest paper, noting any changes in her full-figured body, and would design the elaborate gowns — with beads and appliques — that she knew Fitzgerald loved. She was a teacher in her 20s, on her way to the First Colored American Congregational Church in Lower Manhattan, where she was the regular organist, when a conductor ordered her off a horse-drawn Third Avenue trolley and told her to wait for a car reserved for black passengers. He set records in his teens and was a world champion at 20. When Scott Joplin’s father left the North Carolina plantation where he had been born a slave, there was one thing he wanted to hold on to: the echoes of the Negro spirituals he had heard in the fields. We hope you’ll spread the word about Overlooked — and tell us about others we’ve missed. A portrait of Elizabeth Jennings published in The American Woman’s Journal in 1895. When the first blow is struck, there will be more money to help.” Officials most likely believed it was written by a wealthy Northerner who had helped fund Brown’s attempt to incite, and arm, an enormous slave uprising by taking over an arsenal at Harpers Ferry in Virginia. One of the captivating nina Mae McKinney plays Rozelia in the post-Civil War era, Times. 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